Party to take call on Mamata: Gurudas Dasgupta

KOLKATA: CPI veteran Gurudas Dasgupta wants the Congress-led UPA government to go, but has no comment when Mamata Banerjee seeks his party's support for her proposed no-confidence resolution against the government.

"I have nothing to say," Dasgupta said on Tuesday when asked about Mamata's appeal to him. Earlier in the day, the chief minister had said that she called Dasgupta to seek his party's support for the no-trust motion. "If Gurudasda's party brings a no-trust motion, we are ready to support it," Mamata said, taking cue from the CPI veteran's comment two days ago that his party would not bail out the government if the motion is introduced in Parliament.

According to CPI sources, Dasgupta made the comment "on his own", sparking a debate in party circles. Dasgupta's flip-flop prompted the CPI to resolve the confusion at the national secretariat meeting on Wednesday. "We will finalise our stand at a meeting tomorrow," CPI veteran A B Bardhan said.

Dasgupta, till the other day, had shot down interpretations that his comments were at variance with former CPI secretary Bardhan's remark that his party won't endorse a no-confidence motion brought with BJP's support. "There is no difference between us. I talked to Bardhan before making the comment," Dasgupta said.

However, the confusion refused to die down. Instead, it assumed new proportions when Dasgupta's colleague in the party national secretariat, Bengal party secretary Manju Majumdar, differed with him on this issue. "Mamata Banerjee should first clarify what she was doing when the NDA government gave the go-ahead to FDI entry. She was a Cabinet minister then," Majumdar said. When asked about Dasgupta's views, Majumdar said: "He is free to give his opinion in the party meeting."

While Dasgupta loyalists laboured to stand by him, others felt that he was using his seniority in the party to cross the organisational Lakshman rekha. Dasgupta's detractors in the Left camp cited instances where Dasgupta had different views even after the four Left parties had arrived at an understanding on a tactic. In this case also, Dasgupta digressed from the common understanding of the Left parties for reasons best known to him. It became clear on Tuesday when CPM general secretary Prakash Karat said: "We have discussed the matter twice and our united stand is that we will not support Trinamool Congress's no-confidence motion."